I recently had the pleasure of receiving the “Regular” badge, which equates to trust level 3 on Discourse forums (such as the Privacy Guides forum).
According to Understanding Discourse Trust Levels, I will lose this level if I do not keep following the requirements.
Is this information up-to-date?
I understand that this requirement is about keeping “regulars” active, but it seems a bit like a dark-pattern, to force you to use the forum all the time, or lose a status.
Yes, that is correct.
Apart from making our dumb monkey brain sad, what does this matter?
It doesn’t really.
But:
Users at trust level 3 can…
- Recategorize and rename topics
- […]
- TL3 spam flags cast on TL0 user posts immediately hide the post
- TL3 flags cast on TL0 user posts in sufficient diversity will auto-silence the user and hide all their posts
- Make their own posts wiki (that is, editable by any TL1+ users)
- […]
Those addition privileges are helpful to the community. Ideally, you would actually have quite a few regulars, and they would help you with the community.
But, when you basically make them “work” or lose the privileges, you sort of make the role unobtainable. Personally, I want to contribute to the forum, but not necessarily to such a degree as is required for this role (and as such, I’d lose it, therefore giving me less ability to contribute, leading to me being less useful - a cycle):
To get to trust level 3, in the last 100 days…
- Must have visited at least 50% of days
- Must have replied to at least 10 different non-PM topics
- Of topics created in the last 100 days, must have viewed 25% (capped at 500)
- Of posts created in the last 100 days, must have read 25% (capped at 20k)
- Must have received 20 likes, and given 30 likes.*
- Must not have received more than 5 spam or offensive flags (with unique posts and unique users for each, confirmed by a moderator)
- Must not have been suspended or silenced in the last 6 months
* These likes must be across a minimum number of different users (1/5 the number), across a minimum number of different days (1/4 the number). Likes cannot be from PMs.
That is definitely part of the intent of the design. I think it is meant to:
But, when you basically make them “work” or lose the privileges, you sort of make the role unobtainable.
At level 3 you are entrusted with some somewhat significant authorities (to alter other peoples post titles, move posts, and even to censor/hide the posts of a newer user). I think that this should be a level of privilege that very few people obtain, and should require active and ongoing participation. Maybe the bar is set to high, I don’t know, but it should be set high.
There are many ways to contribute to this community, and only a couple of them are related to trust level 3.
Which aspects do you feel would be difficult to maintain? We can always adjust thresholds, but given the number of people who have met the requirements (including yourself) it doesn’t seem too unsustainable to me.
There is a sort of “principle of least privilege” aspect to it that @xe3 is alluding to too. It doesn’t make sense to keep heightened community moderation powers with people who are no longer active community participants.
The hardest to maintain for me would be probably this one:
- Must have received 20 likes, and given 30 likes.*
* These likes must be across a minimum number of different users (1/5 the number), across a minimum number of different days (1/4 the number). Likes cannot be from PMs.
The rest is just stuff you yourself can do (visiting, replying, reading, behaving).
[…] it doesn’t seem too unsustainable to me.
[…] It doesn’t make sense to keep heightened community moderation powers with people who are no longer active community participants.
Indeed, it could be worse. And I get that.
I just don’t want using the forum to feel like a chore. Quantifying what active means seems a bit like the wrong way to go. Now, I may visit the forum more, but I will be doing it because I have to, not because I want to.
And, some people may visit the forum a few times a month, but be very active/productive, while some who visit every day may not do much. But, that first group will fail the first criteria, despite everything they contribute.
I also know these aren’t your rules. They’re from Discourse. I don’t disagree with their intentions, but it feels like making it like social media; giving people special roles they lose if they don’t engage enough, is not really necessarily conducive to actually well operating forum. Quality > quantity, in my opinion.
Well, they are my rules since every aspect is configurable, I’m just pondering whether a change from defaults is necessary or not.
If anything, I kinda think it’s too low. I had barely glanced at the level perks and whatnot, so had no clue I can edit others posts. You might want consider throwing together an introduction/guide to how and when we’re supposed to utilise those tools properly. Seeing as we have some “mod-light” powers and I at least had no clue.
As for if the thresholds should be tweaked or not I think depends on what sort of roles the different levels are desired to play on the forum.
Not to hard really over 100 days. But I quite agree about quality > quantity, so I could definitely see this part being replaced with a total minimum requirement instead.
In my opinion the current defaults seem like they are roughly what they should be. Level 3 should be somewhat of a high bar considering the privileges it grants, and the status it indicates (being a “regular” does indicate regular somewhat consistent engagement (and having these members is beneficial to the community).
If I understand correctly, that just means that in practice you’ll need to receive 20 likes, over a period of 100 days, and those likes must come from a minimum of 4 different users.
Or framed differently that means you’ll need to reveive an average of 1.4 likes per week, and give 2.1 likes per week over a 100 day period.
To me that doesn’t’ seem unattainable or excessive for the highest level of privilege.
I just don’t want using the forum to feel like a chore. Quantifying what active means seems a bit like the wrong way to go. Now, I may visit the forum more, but I will be doing it because I have to, not because I want to.
I think maybe you are getting overly hung up on the levels/ gamification and seeing it in the wrong way. Levels 0-2 are more like rights when you qualify, you are granted certain rights, and those are permanent/not dependent on continued engagement. But level 3 is conceptually different, it is a set of non-permanent privileges (that carry more weight/responsibility), granted to a small portion of the more engaged members in good standing. Its not something everyone will attain and not something most people should really care about attaining. Not attaining (or attaining and then losing) level 3 doesn’t indicate that you aren’t an active / constructive / important part of the community, and you won’t lose level 2. I think you shouldn’t feel any need to achieve this level, or feel like your worth to the community is any less if you don’t attain this level.
edit: also, I just want to make clear ^ this is all my personal opinion, and not something I’ve thought through deeply, and not something I’m super invested in, so take it all with a grain of salt.
edit 2: also, as a point of illustration, after 33 minutes, this comment and its 2 likes has already exceeded the likes needed for the entire week to maintain level 3.
We can’t. We can change the title and category of a thread. Contents of posts are off-limits.
That is a good idea though. These Discourse roles just come out of a nowhere and don’t come with a good explanation (the powers and requirements can only be found by searching the web).
Agree there as well.
When put that way, it doesn’t sound that bad. For some reason in my brain it sounds like a lot otherwise.
While I agree, I think it’s basic psychology that will still make you want to attain it.
There is much of that on the whole forum. For example, there is literally a leaderboard where community members are ranked in terms of their engagement.
As I’ve said before, this is useful for keeping a forum engaged, but not necessarily for just achieving the best privacy-related forum possible.
I feel you. I am easily manipulated by gamified systems 
as much as we all make fun of ‘imaginary internet points’ most of us are at least somewhat affected by this (especially those of us–like me-- with a touch of OCD-like tendencies…). But I don’t think that means the system itself is bad or good, or that there is anything inherently wrong with tuning a system towards incentivizing desirable behaviors/outcomes. Its only when the outcomes the system is tuned for are counter to the interests of the community/users that this becomes a bad thing (such as most of the dark patterns with social media that are tuned towards advertising, data harvesting, and addictiveness).
I really dont think a lot about these kinds of things.
If I read something that seems reasonable I just give a like.
Then one day, I am regular. If I do not become regular and have the title, its fine, because I know I am a regular and Discourse doesnt need to tell me that.
With regards to flagging and editing, I should probably do that more.
Yes, I agree. The system is the way it is, which is not good or bad. But, I’m not so sure this system is right for Privacy Guides (or at least not the way it is currently - that leaderboard, for example, is problematic - how can you “win” at promoting privacy?).
I wouldn’t think of it in those terms personally. I don’t believe I’ve actually seen any leaderboard so I can’t say exactly how it is, but I think of those leaderboard type things as more just recognition for engaged members. Most people won’t pay any attention, and I don’t think it should be viewed in terms of winning/competition/etc.
Also I think you would be better off not thinking of the gamification in the context of privacy. Think of it in terms of participation, and social health of the community irrespective of the topic of the community. It relates to the forum itself more than it relates to the topic of the forum. (At least that is how I see it). What level of forum participation you attain, is only a reflection on your forum participation, and how you engage with other members, it doesn’t indicate your contributions towards promoting privacy.
That’s what I meant. I shouldn’t be able to do even that without a solid in-your-face-can’t-skip-this-introduction.
You’re only saying that cause you’re in the top 5! 
maybe there should be a tutorial thing like for when you reach the lower trust level the bot shows you the edit, undelete, tags etc functions but for the ‘regular’ trust level functions/privileges if that’s possible?
Perhaps one thing that would make this better, is if it were possible to see these stats somewhere.
Obviously only using the forum to retain the trust level is not what’s intended. But it should be possible to know if you’re keeping up with the requirements.